


Plum

by uaevuon



Series: Rainbow Fruit Smoothie [3]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Family, Food, Gen, Other, Road Trips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-16
Updated: 2015-06-16
Packaged: 2018-04-04 17:44:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4146984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/uaevuon/pseuds/uaevuon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sasha and Mikasa take a cross-country road trip over spring break.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Donuts, Coffee Cups, and the Shape of the Universe

**Author's Note:**

> This is a side-story to [Orange](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1620434) and takes place concurrent to chapters 26-32 or so. 
> 
> warnings: ignoring speed limits, avoiding a dysfunctional family, the author does not know Spanish well. future chapters will include mentions of past sexual assault on a child so proceed with caution.

“No. Put the map away.” 

Sasha pouted, but did as she was told. She stuffed the map into the over-filled glove compartment. 

“I’m not dealing with the map unless it’s absolutely necessary,” Mikasa said. She got into the passenger’s side seat of Sasha’s car. What kind of car was it? Eh, fuck if she knew. Mikasa didn’t know shit about cars. It worked and it fit all their stuff, that’s what mattered. “We have cell service for most of the trip, so we’re using Google Maps for as long as we can.”

“You’re grumpy this morning,” Sasha said. 

“I’m grumpy every morning. I need coffee.”

“We’ll go to Dunkin’ Donuts first.” Mmmm, donuts. Sasha wanted a dozen. She’d probably let Mikasa have a few. 

Mikasa was about to argue that their coffee was shit, but she’d been drinking the weird, watery dining hall coffee for a semester and a half now. Dunkin’ would probably taste like heaven. Therefore, she stayed quiet, though she stared out the side window in anger at the slowly rising sun. It was too fucking early in the morning to be awake. 

“First stop --”

“We’re not stopping,” Mikasa interrupted. “We’re switching off driving duty until we get there. The only stops are bathroom breaks and food breaks. Which we will hopefully combine.”

Sasha glared at her. “I know. I meant our first food break. We’re stopping near Rochester. 

“Right.” Mikasa rolled sort of on her side towards the window, wishing she was still in bed. 

Sasha started the car, and the gentle rumble of the engine lulled Mikasa into a floaty space until they reached the haven of meh donuts and usually acceptable coffee. Sasha asked for Mikasa’s coffee order on the way over, and she mumbled back something that sounded like “large, black, two sugars”. That sounded about right, so Sasha parked on the street and ran into the store. 

She returned to a very much asleep Mikasa, and resolved to wake her up in about 20 minutes. Space naps, yeah! She set up the Google Maps directions thing on Mikasa’s phone and started the drive. 

Driving through town was usually awful, full of traffic, pedestrians everywhere, basically hell for nervous college students in hand-me-down cars, but at 7 AM on a Saturday, most people were probably asleep, so the roads were pretty much clear. Shops were either just opening up or still closed, windows dark, doors locked. A few joggers were out, their heavy steps waking up some homeless bench-dwellers. The sun was still barely risen over the mountains, so the town was bathed in a pale yellow-pink glow. 

It was almost peaceful. But, like Mikasa in the the calming donut-coffee smell inside the car, there was always a sleeping dragon beneath the surface. 

Outside the town and on the highway, Sasha nudged Mikasa awake. “Hey. We’re on the road. Wake up and smell the coffee.”

Mikasa was livid at first, but at the word ‘coffee’ she perked up a bit and reached for her still rather hot cup o’ joe. She took a big gulp. “Fuck yes. Perfect temperature.” She then noticed the box of a dozen donuts on the dashboard. “Can I have one of those or will you bite my hand off?”

“Have one. Not the Boston Creme, though.”

“Wasn’t planning on it.” She took a jelly-filled and scarfed it down. Powder got everywhere. Neither of them cared. Sasha partook in one of her treasured Boston Creme donuts, savouring every bite. 

While Sasha drove, Mikasa watched the sun come up over the valley. As soon as it cleared the tops of the mountains, everything seemed to glitter. Dew that had frozen on the trees overnight started to melt, and there was a river up ahead that caught sunlight in its rippling currents. 

Mikasa held up a hand in front of her eyes to block out the light. It was pretty, but also, it was too early in the morning to appreciate the beauty of the natural world. Also she wasn’t nearly caffeinated enough. 

Still, it had a certain… charm to it. “Hey, Sasha.” Mikasa gestured out of the window. 

Sasha gasped. “So pretty! Take a picture!” 

Mikasa took a while to get the camera on her phone to focus on the passing scenery, but she snapped a few pictures before they passed the river. She turned it back to the map app. 

The radio, tuned in to a Springfield station, started to crackle almost two hours into their drive. They were minutes from the Connecticut/New York border. “This station cuts out in a few miles; you probably know the New York ones better than I do.” Sasha flapped her hand towards the radio.

Mikasa wracked her brain for the city stations. She lived a ways outside the city, but there were a few that she liked that had that wide of a range. After a fight with Sasha’s radio (it didn’t seem to appreciate change), she settled on a classic rock station, because she thought it would suit long drives across the country. 

“No,” Sasha said, after the morning DJ said the show’s tagline. 

“No?”

“No. I don’t want to listen to fifty middle-aged white guys with guitars whine about how unfair the system is to them because girls won’t sleep with them and their only solace is drugs.”

“Isn’t that true of any genre?”

“No. Some of them have few to no middle-aged white guys. Some of them have criticisms beyond those fuelled by learned misogyny. Some of them involve middle-aged white guys who are actually somewhat conscious about the world around them and whine about how the system is unfair to other people and they’re part of the system and they know they need to do better.”

Mikasa was surprised Sasha had the energy to rage against the patriarchy so early in the morning. “Wow. You’re a Wall-ie for sure.” She changed the station, because Sasha was totally right. The new one was playing something by a group Mikasa knew to be middle-aged white guys with guitars who whined about how unfair the system is to them, but it was a mostly-indie station with a pretty big variety and this was just bad timing. The next song was by one of Mikasa’s favourite (but widely underloved) queer girl groups. 

Sasha nodded like she was witnessing profound wisdom disseminated gently unto the masses. Which she kind of was... except it was less “gently” and more “with violent handbell-crashing and intense, explosive bass guitar solos”. She looked impressed even with half a cream-filled donut hanging out of her mouth. 

“What’s that band called?” she asked, after the song ended. 

“Roq. R-O-Q. They’re a group of queer girls, around our age, from… I think New Zealand?”

“I’ll look them up later. Remind me.”

At the end of the second hour in the car, Mikasa’s legs were starting to cramp for lack of movement. She tried to stretch them, and felt an odd tightness in her knees. 

The caffeine may have made her more alert, but it didn’t stop Mikasa’s legs from falling asleep as soon as she settled back into her previous position. “Ow, shit, owowowowow--” She started to rub her legs and rotated her feet, anything to ease the sparking tension in her shins and ankles. 

“Oh, hon… How do you ever watch movies?” 

“It’s different!” she whined. She didn’t know how it was different, but it was, somehow. There had to be some scientific reason why Mikasa’s legs didn’t fall asleep during movies, but did when in the car. Mikasa didn’t really remember much about the scientific method -- hypothesis was in there somewhere, probably followed by experiment? -- but she was sure it could be applied to this phenomenon. 

“Poor baby. Have another donut.”

“Donuts won’t fix this!”

“Sure they will. Have a chocolate one.” 

Mikasa kept moving her feet while she reached for the donut box and extracted a slightly-melty chocolate-covered glazed one. She hissed as she stretched; the pins-and-needles only spread further up her legs. In pure, bitter defiance of the demons clearly eating her legs, she shoved a huge bite of donut in her mouth and chewed viciously. 

Impressively enough, her legs did start feeling less _why_ , but that might have just been because the slightly-stale donut took her mind off of the discomfort. She was starting to regret suggesting a road trip, though. A few hours in and Mikasa was already having leg cramps… they had two whole days ahead of them in the car, with only two (or maybe just one) planned stops for more than food and a quick piss. They wouldn’t shower until they got to Sasha’s house, they wouldn’t sleep in a bed until Sasha’s house, they wouldn’t do any of that cuddling that Mikasa was actually kind of starting to enjoy until Sasha’s house, hell, they wouldn’t even get to change clothes until Sasha’s house. And then there would be unfamiliar people and unfamiliar dogs and unfamiliar ceilings. 

They’d probably get to cuddle, though. Maybe share a bed bigger than dorm room standard twin size. Sasha’s parents wouldn’t mind, though her grandmother was kind of an unknown. 

“Do you think your family would mind if we shared a bed?”

Sasha furrowed her eyebrows, but immediately gave up on trying to place any sort of context on that question. “Abuela won’t care about anything we do as long as we don’t insult her cooking or the Virgin Mary. My brother once came home with three guys and fucked them all in turn, not even bothering to keep it down; Abuela just knitted and watched Food Network in the den right next to his room. At one point she asked me if I thought they’d need snacks. Mom won’t care. Dad won’t notice; he’ll think it’s just a girl thing.”

Mikasa snorted out a laugh. She could tell where Sasha got her love of food from. “I hope she likes me. I hope they all like me.”

“They will. Oh, and, uh, Abuela only speaks Spanish. Well, she knows some swear words and common cooking terms in English, but I’ll probably have to translate for you.”

“Oh.” Better add unfamiliar languages to that list. 

“If you teach her some Japanese, she’ll probably be proud of you for sticking to your roots. Especially if you teach her swear words and cooking terms.” Sasha passed an eighteen-wheeler, speeding up far more than was probably safe on any four-lane New York highway. 

Mikasa clutched the seat below her while her stomach did somersaults. “Sasha holy shit slow down!”

“Sorry!” Sasha slowed a little, finished passing the truck and got a few more cars ahead, then properly joined the flow of traffic in the second lane from the right. “I hate driving near trucks. I always feel like they’re gonna squish me.”

“I understand, just, warn me. I’ve gotten carsick a few times before.”

“Wait, you get motion sickness from moving really fast?” 

Mikasa nodded. “Sometimes.”

“Oh. Hmm. Maybe you should just… sleep through tomorrow.”

“What?”

Sasha smiled nervously. “Oh, nothing. Just, uh, I was planning to cut a good chunk of hours out of our driving time by going 120 through the empty roads in the Midwest. Come to think of it, there’s a few places I can do that _before_ Chicago, too…”

Mikasa groaned and clutched at her stomach. She could already feel the nausea coming. 

\---

At their first rest stop, somewhere around Scranton, Mikasa headed straight for the snack stand and bought herself some gum and some sleep meds, because they didn’t have anything for motion sickness and she’d rather spend a few hours knocked out than holding back vomit. They did their bathroom business, and then assessed the fast food choices. 

“Sbarro, Nathan’s, or Subway?” Mikasa asked. 

“Subway,” Sasha decided. “At least _some_ of their toppings are fresh.”

They ate while walking around the parking lot. Mikasa’s legs were a little wobbly from being in the car so long. She finished half of her footlong, and Sasha ate a whole one. 

“This isn’t judgmental, I’m just curious. How do you eat so much?” 

Sasha patted her stomach. “Years of practice.”

“Is that really all?”

“Yeah! I’ve been cooking since I could reach the stove, and when you cook, you’re supposed to taste everything, so I’d end up full by the time I got to the table. But I couldn’t just not eat my own food, so I’d have a full plate anyway. Over time I just sort of got used to it.” Might not be so great for her health, but she exercised and used natural ingredients when she could. Except for snack food. Easy Mac was more important than personal health. 

“Think I’ll get to see you cook while you’re home?”

“Oh, definitely!” Sasha clapped her hands together. “I’ve been wanting to cook out of class for so long, and Abuela told me if I don’t cook with her while I’m home she’ll disown me.”

“Disown you?”

“It’s a joke. She wouldn’t say it if she thought I didn’t want to.”

Mikasa thought to her own family, and to Grisha and Eren’s fights, where disownment was always a possibility, and all too often a serious threat. Grisha would never do it, because he wanted to at least appear to have a functional family, but the truth was that ever since Carla died there was very little holding them together. Mikasa, of course, would go with Eren no matter what happened, but the prospect of being on their own, as two college kids with very little money to their own names, was terrifying. 

“Are you okay?” Sasha asked. She linked her arm around Mikasa’s. 

“Yeah. Just thinking about home.”

“Homesick?”

“Not at all.” Those three words said so much. “I miss Eren and Armin, but I’m glad I’m here. Even if my legs feel like Jell-o.”

“I hope not _too_ Jell-o. You’re driving.” 

They’d reached the car. Mikasa looked at the scratched red paint and the streaked windshield and sighed. “I built this house. I have to live in it.”

They got in the car, and Mikasa reached for the levers to adjust the driver’s seat but then realised it was already just right for her. She and Sasha were the same height, after all. She still checked all the mirrors anyway. 

Mikasa got her phone out and opened up the map. “Where’s our next stop?”

Sasha looked over at the phone. “Cleveland-ish? We should get there around five.”

“Okay. Plug me in, would you?” 

Sasha hooked up the phone to the charger in the car’s lighter, and then they were off. She sighed almost as soon as they were on the highway. “There’s a great place to speed starting about 50 miles from here, but I guess you won’t want to.”

“I get less sick if I’m the one driving. I’ll see what I can do.”

She did in fact make it through about 30 miles of going well over the speed limit. Not quite at Sasha’s desired 120 miles per hour, but she cut off maybe an hour from their trip. 

The car flew through the Pennsylvania/Ohio border much too fast and with all the windows open, enjoying the uncharacteristically warm evening. The only music stations that the radio would latch onto were one that played mostly Top 40, and another that was two laid-back women playing whatever they felt like listening to and forgetting how often they were supposed to do ads. They’d been listening to the latter for the last hour or so, and at this point were singing along to Tegan and Sara. 

“Maybe we _are_ lesbians,” Sasha joked, without thinking. Mikasa laughed, so it was okay. 

Sasha stuck her head out of her window. After determining that yes, they were going fast enough, she let her hair loose from its ponytail and let it whip around behind her in the wind. 

“Sasha! Put your head back in!”

“You can’t control me!” Sasha laughed into the wind, and it pulled at her face and caught in her wide-open mouth, stretching her skin comically. 

Mikasa kept her eye on the road ahead and her left hand firmly on the wheel; with her right, she reached out and grabbed the sleeve of Sasha’s shirt and yanked her back in the car. “No,” she said. She was not having any of that while going this fast. “Keep all parts of your body inside the ride at all times.”

“No fun!” 

“I’m going a hundred miles an hour, this should be fun enough for you.”

“Nope!” Sasha stuck her arm out, because Mikasa couldn’t physically stop her from doing that. 

“You fucking dork.” She ruffled Sasha’s hair, messing it up more than the wind already had. 

Mikasa noticed a car off in the distance, and then two more, and she started to slow down gradually. They were nearing Cleveland, so even the empty one-lane roads they were taking to avoid tolls were pretty empty. They weren’t really going through the city, but all roads lead to big cities eventually. 

“Let’s stop a little before Akron,” Sasha said, looking at the phone map. “I need to pee again.” 

“Is there anywhere to stop?”

“...Hopefully? When my dad drove me over here in September we stayed in Cleveland overnight, so I don’t actually know this area.” She zoomed in on the map on Mikasa’s phone and squinted. “I think this says there’s a rest stop.”

The rest of the ride went more or less the same. Mikasa did throw up, but only once, somewhere in Nebraska, and she gave Sasha enough warning that she was able to do it on the side of the road and not in Sasha’s car. 

\---

“We’re almost there, we’re almost there!” Sasha bounced in her seat as she drove past the “Welcome to Weed, California” sign. The trip had taken two days of almost non-stop driving. They would arrive a little before noon. 

Mikasa laughed. “You would live here.”

“Hey, I don’t live _in_ Weed. Just close. Aaaah, I’m so excited! What do you want for dinner?”

“I’m fine with anything.”

“Nuh-uh, you’re our guest.” Sasha got very serious. “A guest _always_ contributes at least one idea to the meal.”

“I don’t really know what to ask for.” 

“Okay, well, what kind of meat are you in the mood for?” Sasha made a sharp turn, and screeched out an excited whoop. 

“Ohhh my god.” Mikasa held on tight to the nearest grabby thing she could find. “Sasha.”

“Sorry, sorry, I forgot.” She slowed down and took the next turn with a little more grace. 

When Mikasa could breathe easy again, she made her decision. “I haven’t had a good steak in a while.”

“Beef?”

“Yeah.”

“Done. Dad will like you.”


	2. Arroz con Leche, Swears, and Cops Who Don’t Deserve Their Badges

“I’m hooooooome!” Sasha shouted instead of ringing the doorbell. The door swung open to reveal a plump old lady in a floral-print dress and slippers, and carrying a beautifully carved wooden cane, which she propped up against the door to throw her arms wide. 

“Sasha!” she shouted, just as loud. 

Sasha dropped her duffle bag and sprinted up the steps, stopping just short of her grandmother before throwing her arms around her. “¡Te extrañé!”

Mikasa stood awkwardly at the foot of the stairs and watched the reunion. She picked up Sasha’s rejected bag and slung it over her shoulder. She thought she heard her name, and perked up a little. 

“¿Tu nombre es Mikasa?” Sasha’s grandmother asked. 

Sasha giggled. “She’s asking if your name is Mikasa.”

Mikasa nodded. 

The old woman smiled wide. “Mikasa... “ She gestured toward the house. “Mi casa.”

“Oh my God, Abuela… Hey, why are you carrying my bag?” Sasha jumped down the steps and snatched it from Mikasa. “Guests aren’t valets unless we pay them.”

“I’m stronger than you.”

“Shhh, doesn’t matter. Come on in!” She grabbed Mikasa by the arm and pulled her into the house. It was much smaller than the Jagers’ house, closer in size really to the apartment she’d grown up in with her parents, with low ceilings and low windows and low handles on door frames. Mikasa assumed Sasha’s family was all relatively short -- her abuela had been -- and that there weren’t many people, but when she got to the kitchen and saw five people stand up from the table, the tallest nearly hitting the light overhead, she realised that wasn’t the reason at all. Maybe this was just normal for them. Here, she was the one out-of-place. 

And yet, they welcomed her with open arms. Sasha’s oldest brother picked Mikasa up in a bone-crushing hug, and Mikasa, though a little overwhelmed, would not be outdone and hugged him back harder. She received several more hugs, the gentlest being from Sasha’s father.

Lunch was served what seemed like only moments later; sliced chicken sandwiches, slightly spicy, and a mountain of cut-up fruit that Abuela (as she’s insisted Mikasa call her) explained with some difficulty was all grown in their backyard. It was actually a huge communal space made up from the backyards of several nearby houses. Strawberries never tasted so sweet. 

Despite that they’d gotten in a little before noon, they were incredibly tired from the ride and from sleeping only in short bursts on not-too-bumpy roads, and it showed in drooping eyes and decreasing participation in conversation. Sasha’s mom ushered them up to her room, insisting they sleep well before dinner, and she’d do their laundry while they slept. 

\---

Sasha woke to the smell of beef wafting up from below. She shot up from the bed, shouting “MEAT!”, which startled Mikasa so violently out of her sleep that she fell out of bed on the other side. 

“OW! Sasha!”

“Meat! Meat! Meat! Meat!” Sasha put her pants back on, still chanting. “Get up! Get up! Meat!”

Mikasa groaned and dragged a pillow off the bed, dropping it over her face. “Sleep.”

Sasha grabbed her arm. Mikasa was strong and rather heavy for her size but Sasha was fuelled by the prospect of delicious medium-rare steaks, fresh off the grill, and whatever mouth-watering and _properly made_ Mexican food -- not the weird, bland burritos from Wall. So Sasha won this tug-of-war, and managed to lift about half of Mikasa off the ground before Mikasa gave up and got up on her own. 

Sasha bounced down the stairs, Mikasa following more glumly behind, and Sasha warned her family very loudly that Mikasa was “a giant grumpy-pants when she wakes up”. 

Mikasa promptly received a steaming cup of coffee and downed it without tasting it. Much better. 

They all sat down to dinner; Abuela said Grace, which was a little awkward for Mikasa as she a) hadn’t been raised in any particularly religious family so had never experienced this before and b) didn’t understand a word of what was being said aside from “Maria” and “Jesús”, but she said “Amen” when everyone else did, albeit a little later. 

“This isn’t too weird for you, is it?” Sasha asked in an undertone. 

Mikasa shook her head. “It’s unusual for me but I know it’s important to you.” She thought of herself as agnostic, with a soft spot for the Shinto and Jewish traditions her parents had been very loosely affiliated with. Then again, she had a soft spot for just about anything related to her parents. 

“Mikasa,” Abuela called. She pointed to the steak Sasha’s dad had just served her. “How say, _en japonés_?”

She assumed that meant “in Japanese”, so she translated it for her. “ _Niku_.” Okay, technically it would have been “ _suteeki_ ” but Abuela would probably be looking for something a little more traditional. Abuela pointed at the rice. “ _Gohan_.” And the guacamole. Mikasa thought about it for a moment; she was sure there must be a word for avocados. “I don’t know,” she admitted. 

Abuela clicked her tongue and shook her head, which would have made her seem disappointed had she not been smiling all the while. 

“Tell her how to swear,” Sasha reminded her. 

“I’m not going to tell your grandmother how to swear!” Mikasa said, but Sasha’s mom egged her on. 

“Do it, she loves that. _¿Quieres que le diga cómo maldicen, mamá?_ ”

“ _¡Sí, por supuesto!_ ” She nodded fiercely. 

Mikasa went red in the face and, under the table, wrung her hands together. Somehow, it seemed wrong to teach a sweet old lady how to swear. “Shit is _kuso_.”

“ _Kuso_ ,” Abuela repeated. “Fuck?” she requested. 

“It’s the same.”

“ _Lo mismo_ ,” Sasha explained. “Most of them are, right?” Mikasa nodded, so she relayed that to her abuela as well. 

Abuela nodded. “Bitch?” 

“ _Ama_ , but that can also mean a nun.”

Sasha made a face and translated. Abuela shook her head. 

“What is mean, ‘Mikasa’?”

“I don’t know. I’d have to know the kanji.” She looked at Sasha, silently urging her to translate. “The, um, the letters we use… sometimes they sound the same, but look different, so they mean different things.” 

Sasha did translate that, as best as she could. 

“Ask parents?”

Mikasa shook her head. “They’re dead.”

Abuela understood that. She crossed herself and murmured something with her hands clasped; Mikasa assumed it was a prayer for the dead. She didn’t press for more information, and for that Mikasa was grateful. She couldn’t talk about it without bringing up Eren, and she _wouldn’t_ tell that story without him around. 

“Me too,” Sasha’s dad supplied. “My brother and I had to take care of ourselves for most of our lives. 

“A friend’s family took me in.” Mikasa looked down at her food. Sasha’s knee bumped into hers, and stayed pressed against her. When Mikasa looked over at her, she was smiling, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. It wasn’t as comforting as she intended. 

“My brother wanted to be here, actually; he said he wanted to see you home, Sasha.”

Sasha’s knee pressed more insistently against Mikasa’s. “That’s fine, he doesn’t have to be here,” she said, and she shoved dry rice into her mouth, not noticing her brother was passing her a dish of sauce for it. 

Mikasa knew better than to ask at the table why she was suddenly so nervous. 

\---

“Sasha?” Mikasa asked as they were getting ready for bed. It was well past midnight; they’d stayed up so late, as a family finishing off an enormous pot of Abuela’s rice pudding, but Sasha had been unusually quiet the whole night and had only eaten a single helping. “Are you okay?”

“No, I’m not.” She laid down on the bed and curled into herself. 

Mikasa joined her. She knew Sasha wasn’t in the mood to talk about it. So she pulled the blankets up and hugged her close, hoping that was enough to comfort her at least a little bit.

\---

Despite how late everyone had gone to bed the night before, they were all up early again the next day. Sasha’s parents and older brother had to work, and her younger brothers had school, and Abuela was always an early riser anyway, up at the crack of dawn to make breakfast because, in her eyes, what was the point of living to an old age if one didn’t continue _living_?

There was also one unfamiliar person at the table. 

“What is he doing here?” Sasha said. She stopped short in front of Mikasa.

“Hi, Sasha,” the man said. He smiled, not unkindly, but Mikasa’s heart hammered in her chest and she had the strangest urge to run. 

“I told you he wanted to be here last night,” Sasha’s dad said. “He was working.”

“But why is he _here_?” Sasha’s voice wavered, and Mikasa reached out to gently grab the back hem of her shirt. 

“He lives here now. Didn’t we tell you?”

Sasha turned and ran up the stairs. Mikasa followed, calling her name. “Sasha! _Sasha_!”

Mikasa just barely made it in the door before Sasha slammed it shut and locked it. She crumpled onto the floor and didn’t bother to hold back the loud sob that erupted out of her. Mikasa kneeled down next to her. “Sasha. Sasha, what’s wrong?”

Sasha didn’t answer. She just clung to Mikasa and cried. 

She didn’t have to say it, though. Mikasa knew. She’d heard that story too many times. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” She rubbed Sasha’s back. “Let’s… Let’s go. Let’s leave. We have your car, we can just go back.” She didn’t know where they’d stay, but they couldn’t stay here. 

“This is my house!” Sasha cried. “He’s making me leave my own house. Hasn’t he taken enough from me?”

“He’s not making you leave. You can make that choice yourself.”

“M-my family…” She gasped. 

Mikasa hugged her tighter. She didn’t know what to say to that. Sasha wouldn’t want to leave her family behind. They’d come all this way to see them. 

“They know!” Sasha practically screamed. She pushed Mikasa away and screamed again towards the door. “THEY KNOW! They know what he did to me! And they don’t care!” She stood up. Tears still flowed from her eyes, but she was determined. “Let’s go. Fuck them. Let’s go.” She paced around the room, shoving freshly washed and folded clothes into bags, not bothering to sort them out. 

Mikasa helped her, also going with the fast way rather than the less confusing way. They had to leave. “I’m sorry,” Mikasa repeated. “You deserve better than this.”

“I know I do.” Sasha looked over at Mikasa. She didn’t smile, but she looked grateful. “Thank you. I probably would have tried to tough it out if not for you.”

“No problem.” She could have said more. But she didn’t. Sasha didn’t need her story, not now. She had enough on her mind. 

All packed up, Sasha looked around her room. Was there anything else she wanted to take with her? It hit her all at once that there was a very good chance she’d never return here. She bit her lips together, willing herself not to cry again. She didn’t need anything.

They marched down the stairs, duffle bags slung over their shoulders. Mikasa went first, and she kept herself between Sasha and her uncle; she was tense, ready to leap for the nearest knife and stab him through the heart if he so much as dared come close. 

It was Abuela who tried to block the door. “Sasha. _Es familia._ ”

“ _Sabes lo que hizo._ ”

“ _Es familia,_ ” Abuela repeated. 

“ _Entonces yo no lo soy. Moverse._ ” She stepped forwards, but Abuela pushed her back. 

" _Es pecado que abandonar a su familia._ ”

“ _¿Y no es un pecado asalto a una niña?_ ” She reached around Abuela for the door handle and pulled. 

Abuela leaned against the door, using her weight to stop Sasha from leaving. 

Mikasa had had enough. To think that only last night she’d been embarrassed to teach this woman how to swear. “ _Kuso_!” she shouted, and she reached around Sasha and yanked at the door handle. She dislodged Abuela, who stumbled to the side. Mikasa held the door open and pushed Sasha out, then slipped out behind her. 

Sasha was shaking on the front step. There was a police cruiser parked in the driveway; for a moment Mikasa cheered inwardly, thinking they’d been saved, but then Sasha spat at it. 

“He’s still got his badge, then. I hope he gets shot.”

Mikasa couldn’t disagree with that. She pinched the keys from Sasha’s pocket. “I’m driving.”


	3. Crepes, Times Square, and Ackerman Secrets

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> heads-up for a switch in verb tense.

“Let’s go to New York.”

They’ve been driving back across the country, switching off but with Mikasa doing most of the driving. There’s no rush to rocket across the empty roads of the square states, so they take their time, driving well under the speed limit. And silent. Utterly silent but for a notice that it’s time to pee or get food or switch drivers, and even that comes in clipped words and Sasha is still near tears, has been for the entire ride, so when Mikasa says this out of the blue it startles her. 

“Let’s go to New York,” Mikasa repeats, and she takes her eyes off the needle-straight country road to look at Sasha, who is slouched down in her seat and has a dead look in her watery eyes as she had since they left her home. 

Sasha doesn’t turn her head, just lifts her eyes and squints to show she’s confused and slightly annoyed. 

“I’m serious.”

“So we’re going to leave my unsafe house and go to yours?” Sasha spits. She doesn’t blame any of this on Mikasa and Mikasa knows it but it still hurts to hear Sasha like this, angry and mean in a way she never, ever is. 

Mikasa averts her eyes, looking back to the road so she doesn’t have to see how much pain her friend is in. “I meant the city. I know someone there; his apartment is tiny and shitty but he’ll let us stay, and we can just. Eat our way through the rest of the week.”

“What’s he like?” Sasha asks. 

“An asshole, honestly. He’s this… aggressive anarcho-monarchist --

“What?”

“I know. He loves guns; doesn’t have any, but he loves them. And he works as a garbage collector not because he actually cares about the job or has any respect for it, and not because he ‘couldn’t get anything better’ or whatever, but because he loves seeing the refuse of humanity and being reminded daily that we are all essentially massive trash producers.” She takes a deep breath. “But he’s my cousin, and he’ll keep us safe.”

“Your cousin?”

“Yeah. He’s older than me, and he looks it, but he’s my cousin.” 

Sasha looks nervous at the word “older”. 

“He won’t touch us. He’s super fucking gay, and he wouldn’t even if he wasn’t. He… he knows what that can do to a person.” There’s a story, of course there is, there _always _is, but it’s not Mikasa’s place to tell. Another in the long list of Ackerman secrets.__

__“...Okay,” Sasha decides, mostly because what she wants more than anything right now is a _distraction_. _ _

__So they go._ _

__They arrive Thursday night. Music blares from the street level bar, and it can still be heard in the apartments. As soon as Kenny sees them, despite the late hour, he throws the door wide and stubs out his cigarette in the nearest ashtray. “You look like hell.”_ _

__“We need a place to stay,” Mikasa says. “Just until Sunday.”_ _

__“Both of you?”_ _

__“We can share the couch. You still have a pull-out, right?”_ _

__He smirks. “Thought you were ace.”_ _

__“I am. She’s my friend. This is Sasha,” Mikasa introduces._ _

__Kenny nods at her. “‘Lo, Sasha. You can take the couch if you want.”_ _

__The apartment smells heavily of tobacco smoke and faintly of disinfectant. There’s a knife block on the coffee table, and two in the kitchen, and there are newspapers _everywhere_ , some partially cut up, some clippings of politicians pinned to the walls with notes scrawled on in various colours of pen. The pull-out couch is stained on the cushions, but the pitifully thin mattress is clean when they open it up and the sheets Kenny brings them are folded and smell fresh. _ _

__“Pizza okay for dinner?” he asks. It’s nearly eleven at night._ _

__Mikasa looks to Sasha, who nods._ _

__“Toppings?”_ _

__Mikasa is still looking at Sasha. “Sausage and onion?” she suggests._ _

__Kenny smiles at her. “Sounds perfect.”_ _

__It’s a deep-dish, extra-greasy, extra-cheesy square pie that they have to eat with knife and fork and a bit of spoon. It’s delicious._ _

__\---_ _

__They get up Friday afternoon when Kenny returns from work; he didn’t sleep, which isn’t out of the ordinary for him, but Mikasa and Sasha have gone without for the last two days so they’ve been completely out, arms around each other because it helps them feel safe._ _

__“Thought you might sleep all day,” he asks when they sit up._ _

__Mikasa shakes her head. “We were planning to go get food eventually.”_ _

__Kenny gives them a list of his favourite restaurants and what to get there; the food is cheap but so, so good and Sasha cracks a smile when her first soup dumpling, hot but not too hot, bursts in her mouth._ _

__They go to Times Square; it’s a long walk and it’s getting dark but Sasha wants to climb the steps and Mikasa can’t refuse her anything, not now. The lights are too bright; their jackets aren’t quite warm enough. Mikasa looks over at Sasha, backlit by storefronts and flashing advertisements, her characteristic smile back on her face, and thinks that if they were anyone else this would be where they’d fall in love._ _

__But they’re them, so they stand there for a while and then they go back to Kenny’s apartment with cheesecake that is “expensive but SO worth it” according to Kenny’s notes._ _

__He’s right. Sasha eats half the cake on her own._ _

__On Saturday they get up bright and early and go to a hole-in-the-wall French cafe just off Broadway. They open the crepe menu and stare at it for ten minutes; Mikasa checks her bank balance on her phone and Sasha does the same and they each order more than they ever expect to finish because they just can’t choose. Even Sasha’s steel stomach gives a little nervous gurgle._ _

__They eat everything._ _

__They go to the Apple store on Fifth Avenue and spend over an hour playing mahjong on an iPad in the crowded store before a Genius notices they’re not buying anything and stares at them until they leave. Next on Kenny’s list is an Italian place where the servings are family size, but they’re still stuffed from brunch so they go read manga in the giant Barnes and Noble and blissfully no-one bothers them because it is, after all, a bookstore, and there are plenty of other students around so they don’t look out of place._ _

__They also go to Tiffany’s before dinner, because it’s on the way and they want to look at shiny things. Someone follows them around. They leave quickly; it’s not the first time either of them have been followed in a store, and Sasha’s had the cops called on her before and would rather not repeat the experience, certainly not with the NYPD._ _

__At the Italian place, without looking at the menu Mikasa orders the penne dish that Kenny had suggested; that recommendation came with those instructions._ _

__They share it, and it’s so extraordinarily spiced that Sasha almost orders seconds._ _

__On Sunday they pack up the car and say goodbye to Kenny, but before they leave he passes Mikasa something she never thought she’d see._ _

__“This was your mom’s,” he says, handing her a scrap of embroidered cloth. “It’s her family crest, or something like that. I found it in some of your dad’s old stuff, and I looked it up.” He fidgets a little. He’d been close to his uncle when they were young, despite that they were so close in age yet on different familial tiers; but he’d left as a teenager and when Kenny found out how much of his belongings were willed to him after his death, he’d been shocked. The fact that he was willing to part with any of it was astonishing. “Traditionally everyone in the family would have it scarred into their skin as a kid. I don’t know if that’s something you want to do, but I thought you might like to have it.”_ _

__“Thanks.” Mikasa doesn’t know what more she could say._ _

__“And, hey, I know my place sucks, but feel free to stop by whenever you’re around.”_ _

__“I will. Thank you so much for letting us stay here.”_ _

__Kenny waves it off. “It’s nothing. You too, Sasha. Any friend of Mikasa’s may as well be my family -- and there’s not a lot of Ackermans I can say that about.”_ _

__“Thank you.” She pauses. “And thanks for the food rec’s.”_ _

__He grins. “Anytime. Glad to meet someone who’s as much a foodie as I am.”_ _

__They set out for the last place on Kenny’s restaurant list, a Japanese place with an all-you-can-eat menu for $20 a person. For most people it would be reasonable; involve Sasha, however, and the servers quickly realise that “all-you-can-eat” can in fact mean “eat fucking everything”._ _

__“I don’t want to go back yet,” Sasha says as they wait for the check. “Can we walk a little more before we leave?”_ _

__“Sure. I feel a little too full to sit in a car for four hours anyway.”_ _

__They do walk, somewhat aimlessly but still very much so aware of their surroundings, and when they happen upon a group of people holding signs they’re interested until they see a big “GOD HATES FAGS” on one of them._ _

__“Seriously?” Sasha whines. They’ve been linked arm-in-arm since leaving the restaurant, and one of the protesters sees them and makes a beeline for them._ _

__“Excuse me,” he says, none too kindly._ _

__“You’re excused,” Sasha responds rudely. She and Mikasa try to brush by him, but he’ll have none of it._ _

__“Did you know that your relationship is sinful in the eyes of the Lord?” he says. He tries to hand them a pamphlet._ _

__“Oh, fuck off,” Mikasa says._ _

__Sasha nearly explodes. “What is _wrong_ with you people?” She snatches the pamphlet and throws it to the ground. “How can you do this? I grew up Christian too, and it makes me sick that I’m supposed to share a religious text with scum like you who twist it to fit what you want in the world. You don’t know _shit_ about us and you certainly don’t know anything about God.” _ _

__“Please reconsider --” he begins, but the girls turn away from him and head back the way they came._ _

__“Okay,” Sasha says, “I’ve had enough.”_ _

__“Me too,” Mikasa agrees. It’s time to go back to Wall._ _

__It’s time to go home._ _


End file.
